Bill Carmichael: In denial over a creed of war and peace

Whoops! Sorry! I wondered off the politically correct reservation for a moment there.

What I meant to say, of course, is that the latest atrocities, like all the other terrorist acts that happen on virtually a daily basis, have nothing to do with religion whatsoever, and certainly have nothing to do with Islam.

Ignore if you will the cries of “Allahu Akbar!” as children were murdered and their teachers set alight in Peshawar, and the black flag of Islam complete with the Shahada creed that hostages in Sydney were forced to wave at gunpoint.

Ignore too the terrorists’ demands for Sharia law to be imposed and the return of the Islamic Caliphate.

Whatever made you think that these actions had anything to do with any specific religion?

No, these killings are the work of mentally deranged “lone wolves” who don’t represent any particular creed or ideology – or at least that is what
the political establishment is keen to tell us.

The fact that the killers all follow the same religion and spout the same demands is just one of those astonishing coincidences that happen sometimes. But it is of no significance. Nothing to see here, just move along please.

What we have here, ladies and gentlemen, is the clearest of evidence of what we might call “Islamist denialism”, and the keening of the “Islam is peace” crowd began this week even before the corpses were cold.

Leading the chorus was that great Koranic scholar, David Cameron, who, as usual, was quick to acquit Islam
of any responsibility for the vile acts of violence carried out in the name of
Allah.

“There is not a belief system in the world that can justify this sort of appalling act,” he said after the terror attack in Pakistan.

Oh yes there is Prime Minister! It is called militant Islamism and it is on the march all around the globe.

Let’s get the usual caveats out of the way; not all Muslims are terrorists (although it is clear that the vast majority of terrorists are Muslim).

And the Koran does indeed include verses that promote peace and tolerance – the so called “peace verses”.

But the trouble is that the Koran also includes the “sword verses” that advocate the conquest and subjugation of all non-Muslims.

As a result Islam is as much a religion of war as it is a religion of peace.

Those who follow the path of violent jihad may be in the minority, but their beliefs are not a “perversion” of Islam as Mr Cameron claims. The justification for their bloody murders is right there in their holy texts.

Pretending otherwise is not going to get us anywhere. Neither is the peculiar notion that Muslims must always be portrayed as the victims, even when
they are the perpetrators of terrorist
acts.

In Australia for example, even as the Sydney siege was going on, the hashtag #Illridewithyou began to trend on Twitter in response to a wholly imagined “Islamophobic” backlash.

Forget about the plight of the hostages being threatened with death, what
really matters is that someone might be slightly rude to a Muslim on public transport.

The truth is that there is no “war on Islam”. There is no widespread persecution or discrimination against Muslims in the West. The West maintains open and tolerant societies where
people of all faiths and none are free to earn their living, raise their families, worship and engage in political activity as they wish.

That is indeed why so many Muslims from around the world are so keen to come to Western countries by any means possible. In contrast there isn’t much of a queue to enter Somalia, Yemen or Pakistan.

We shouldn’t allow the Left’s instinctive self-loathing to stop us from defending ourselves. We shouldn’t be afraid of standing up for enlightenment values in the face of the mediaeval bigotry of the Islamists.

Islam in fact doesn’t mean peace – it actually means submission, and in the name of liberty we should steadfastly refuse to do so.